Health and Well-Being-Diet and strength training: A winning combination
The Indianapolis-based American College of Sports Medicine recently published a study in its official monthly journal, Medicine & Science in Sports Exercise, that confirms the beneficial relationship between concurrent weight-loss diet and a regimen of strength/endur- ance training in men.
The team of researchers, led by William J. Kraemer, PhD, of Ball State University in Muncie, IN, analyzed the relationship between the physiological effects of a weight-loss diet with and without exercise, both aerobic and resistance in type. "We wanted to find out what the effects might be with restricted diet alone as compared to diet combined with endurance training, and diet combined with both endurance training and heavy resistance training," says Kraemer. "Weight loss alone is not the optimal goal. The type of mass lost is important."
The final analysis revealed no significant changes over the study period in body mass or composition in the control group, whereas for all three of the other groups, a significant reduction took place by week six, and continued at a slower rate for the following six weeks. By week 12, the diet-alone group had a composite reduced body fat of 69%. At that time the diet-and-exercise group had reduced its body fat at a rate of 78%. But the diet-exercise-strength training group reduced body fat by 97%. The diet-restriction-alone group is the only one of the four that actually lost nonfat (mostly muscle) mass.
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